I'd like to comment on the story I read in Wednesday's Collegian about Rep. John Lawless' threats to Bob Pickrell, who sent him an e-mail in which he insulted Lawless' physical appearance, the result of surgery to remove a brain tumor. Although I believe that Mr. Pickrell was completely out of line by insulting Rep. Lawless' appearance and that Rep. Lawless had every right to be angry, I am appalled that he would stoop to calling Mr. Pickrell at home and threatening to sabotage his efforts to get a teaching job after graduation.

I would expect someone in Rep. Lawless' position to be mature and civilized enough to ignore such insults, or at the very least respond in an angry but restrained manner.

I am also, as a Penn State student, greatly offended by Rep. Lawless' comment that Mr. Pickrell's e-mail "clearly demonstrates the ability or lack thereof of PSU students to communicate on an academic and professional level." Where does he get off generalizing about Penn State students (all 80,000 of us) in such an unfair manner?

I also want to say for the record that although I feel that the some of the Sex Faire's content was needlessly explicit and that much greater emphasis should have been placed on the importance of love and commitment in sexuality, I am very much opposed to Rep. Lawless' efforts to eliminate such events completely by threatening to pull funding from Penn State.

Groups who found the Sex Faire morally offensive could easily exercise their own First Amendment rights and hold an event that approaches sex education in a way they find morally acceptable.